What Didn't Happen
by altschmerz
Summary: After Mike finds out Johnny is alive, and after Briggs leaves the evidence room, the two of them get a chance to talk, and Mike gets to process a loss that hadn't actually happened. (episode tag to season 1 episode 6, hair of the dog. team as family. gen.)


[taps mic] is this thing on? hi, hello, i'm showing up to the fandom five years late with gen fic. if anybody's still around, i hope you like this, and i hope you're ready to see more from me, because i'm certainly not done with this family here.

title from catie rosemurgy's 'america talks to me like a mother'.

* * *

For an undercover, Mike Warren has one of the most expressive faces of anyone Johnny's ever known. If he hadn't seen it for himself, the way Mike can go from showing absolutely every tiny flash of feeling he experiences to betraying nothing at all save what was designed to get the desired reaction from a target, he wouldn't believe it possible. Especially right now, because for the last fifteen or so minutes, Mike has been shooting Johnny looks like he's still trying to convince himself Johnny isn't actually dead. Which is both sweet and sobering, because despite the fact that Johnny _isn't_ dead, Mike doesn't seem to be having an exceptionally easy time processing that. He still looks upset.

They talk with Briggs about the torpedo, about the necessary secrecy involved in making sure the public ever _knows_ that they've recovered a drug-filled torpedo casing, and it's about as normal as a conversation of its kind can really be. Then Briggs leaves, and it's just the two of them and a couple of techs. And still, Mike looks upset. In every moment he doesn't look confused or deep in thought, he looks _upset_.

Which is why, just as everyone is filing out of the room, Johnny can't stand it, and stops Mike in the doorway. He turns and looks over his shoulder, and there's that wide-open expression again, the one that means he still can't quite believe Johnny isn't dead, and if he doesn't look at him often enough he might disappear and go back to being lost at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. _You're killing me here, Mikey_, Johnny thinks, folding his arms and raising an eyebrow.

"You really think I was dead?" That's the question he asks instead of his actual question, 'just how upset _were_ you and how upset are you _still_?' Ultimately, the first question answers the second, if what Mike's face does is any indication.

"Yeah." The word is clipped, followed by a short clear of his throat. "I _really_ did." His hands twitch at his sides, like he's shaking them out before a tremor can make itself known, and for a second it looks like he's somewhere far away before snapping back to the room they're in together, now left alone.

Johnny remembers what Mike had been like right after Eddie died. He'd gone downstairs once in the night, seen the poor guy standing at the counter staring at a pile of clean dishes like he'd never seen them before. Mike's hands, splayed out on the countertop, had been visibly shaking, just like it seemed like they were about to now. Even the next morning on the beach, there had been moments between the laughter, the running around with Paige, moments where Johnny caught Mike looking out at the water like he wasn't seeing it. Like he was seeing something else instead.

This is not Johnny's first rodeo. He knew what was happening then, and he knows what's happening now. He knows about the kind of micro-flashbacks a brain puts a person through, trying to process something terrible and devastating. It's touching, really, it is, never mind the joke he'd made upstairs when he'd noticed Mike was on the edge of crying and Johnny didn't quite know what he was supposed to do. Mike is a soft-hearted greenhorn still, sure, but this isn't like Eddie, not exactly. After Eddie he'd been shocked, traumatized. But what he'd seen in Mike upstairs, what he's still seeing flashes of now, it's more than just shock and trauma. It's grief. Over him.

The thought sends an aching pulse through Johnny's chest, squeezing sharply at what Charlie calls his 'big dumb soft heart'. Mike's eyes, shifting around the room, avoidant and embarrassed, are still rimmed with a red tinge, and he remembers not even half an hour ago, up in the squad room, how Mike had rushed at him, squeezed so hard it had almost hurt.

"Hey, Mikey, come here."

Mike blinks at him like he doesn't understand the instruction. Johnny rolls his eyes and waves a hand, beckoning Mike over. He walks over slowly, crossing the feet between them until he's close enough for Johnny to grab him by the shoulder and pull him into a hug. For a second it's like a reversal of before, Johnny holding on while Mike's arms hover awkwardly, unsure of how he's supposed to react.

"I'm okay, see?" Johnny says, squeezing tighter for a moment and feeling Mike's breathing stutter a little. "I'm okay."

That's what does it, and now Mike is returning the hug, fingers digging into Johnny's back. He's clinging tightly, face pressed into Johnny's shoulder, and his breaths are unsteady. The longer they stand there, though, the more his breathing calms, and so Johnny just stays put and keeps talking, pointless nonsense aimed in no particular direction at all.

"I'm okay. I'm sorry we scared you. I'm okay, I'm fine."

With how hard the bony edge of Mike's shoulder is pressing into Johnny's chest, he's gotta wonder if Mike can actually feel his heartbeat. It's proof he's alive so, honestly, he kind of hopes so, and he breathes deliberately deep, slow and steady inhales and exhales. At one point, Mike loosens his hold a bit, offering Johnny an out but not ready to be the first to break contact. Two can play that game, though, and Johnny wasn't the one who watched a friend die today, so he's certainly not going to be the one to move first.

It's obvious Mike wasn't ready, because as soon as he registers that Johnny isn't moving, his grip returns, and he settles. Johnny's shoulder and neck don't really feel damp, but he wouldn't blame Mike if he were crying. After that kind of day, who _wouldn't_.

_Is that a tear?_ He'd asked, upstairs in the bullpen, before he'd had a read on things, before he'd processed anything about what was going on, how upset Mike was, if Johnny should joke it off or comfort him or promise that it hadn't happened, that he was okay. And then before he'd had the chance to make any kind of choice, Briggs showed up, and Mike punched him, and that had been its own answer.

If it had been him on that boat and Mike in the water, or Briggs, or Paige, or Charlie, or Jakes… Those minutes, the time between when the shot rang out and when they found out Donnie was still alive... Johnny holds Mike just a fraction harder.

After a few more long moments, Mike sniffs audibly and pulls back, turning away and pressing his wrist to his mouth. He looks away across the room, and Johnny leans back into the wall. He gets the feeling that isn't where it ends, that there was something more than the explosion eating at his roommate. After all, Mike hadn't been alone after that. They'd been on a boat, on the ocean. It was hours before they were all back at the office.

Sure enough, eventually, Mike starts talking.

"You were in the water, and Bello was _shouting_ at me, and he said- he said it was my fault, y'know, and he meant about the drugs, but you know, I just kept-" He can't finish, just shakes his head and lets the sentence finish itself, hanging there in the air.

_Oh_, Johnny thinks. _Alright. That's how it is_.

"It wasn't, okay? Even if something had happened and I _hadn't_ come back up," Johnny doesn't even pause his sentence when he reaches back just a bit and knocks his knuckles into the wall - you can never be too careful, "it wouldn't've been your fault. It would've been on Bello, or on me for deciding to go down there, or for whoever's crazy ass decided it was a great idea to not only put drugs in the ocean but then bomb-rig them. Okay?"

Mike shakes his head, wiping his hand over his face again. He's not looking at Johnny, but around at the room, the carcass of the torpedo on the big table they'd been poring over.

"Nope, need to hear an answer," Johnny tells him.

"Has anyone ever told you that you're _incredibly_ annoying?"

It's an obvious diversion but Johnny plays along, blithely answering the question, "Yep. All the time. Answer, please. It was not your fault, okay?"

"Okay." It's muttered and reluctant, and when it's met with silence, Mike glances back at him, head shaking still, even as he says, louder and a little less like his voice might break any second. "Okay. Happy? Okay."

Quiet lapses over the room, a kind of quiet that might be awkward, if Johnny believed in awkward quiet, which he doesn't. If a quiet is uncomfortable, it probably means something important is getting dredged out. It means growth. Mike, however, doesn't seem to be of the same opinion, shifting from foot to foot. Johnny considers him for a moment, eyes narrowed, taking in the lingering hunch in Mike's shoulders, the redness of his eyes. He swipes at his face again, just a flick of his hand like he's annoyed with having to do it, and now Johnny can't help it. He's gotta do _something_ to get that kicked puppy, 'you were never coming home _ever_ and I can't get it out of my head' look off Mike's stupid soft face.

"If it makes you feel any better," Johnny says, shoulder propped against the wall, hoping nobody finds out he told Mike about this, "it's not the first time."

"Excuse me?" The question is a little damp, but there's actual confusion in it, which is good, because 'confused' is not 'upset', and Johnny'll take it. Hopefully he'll even make it to 'amused' before this anecdote is out.

"One time, the whole house thought I bought it - y'know, bad intel and a liaison officer who didn't know how to keep his mouth shut when he didn't know what he was talking about. _Everybody_ thought I was gone for like, six hours. I got home and Jakes was asleep in my room."

"Jakes?" It's a small smile, faint, still a little watery, but it's a smile nevertheless.

_Success_. Johnny nods, returning that little smile with a wide grin of his own. "_Jakes_. Course, then he was all surly at me for like, _a week_, to make up for, I dunno, letting me see that he was maybe a _little upset_ at the idea that I got taken out. God forbid."

This time he even gets a laugh. "That sounds like him."

"Doesn't it though? And man you should've seen _Briggs_, he was so…" Johnny waves a hand, indicating a quintessential Briggs-ness that can't be quantified. "And _Charlie_. Dude, I'm telling you, at least it was just you this time. Nobody to feedback loop with."

The quiet comes back, and Mike seems to be on the same page now, letting it exist without needing to break it, to logic it out lest he shatter under the weight of it. It makes Johnny proud. People like Mike, like Briggs, the people who've always had all the answers, they have a hard time with this, and it's growth that he's even trying. After a minute or so, Johnny takes pity on him, and pushes off the wall.

"Right. Home, then? You need a ride?"

"Nah, man." Mike sighs, looking at the ceiling. "Got some stuff I gotta take care of here first. Paperwork, y'know."

"Oh, yikes, don't I," he says, wincing. No thank you. "Don't mind if I leave you to that and head back? I'm pretty beat."

Mike waves him towards the stairs. "You go, get home. Make sure nobody else got the wrong news."

Johnny starts walking, headed in that direction, then pausing just as he's about to leave Mike's line of sight. "You remember what I said, okay?" He grins, cocking his head to the side and holding out a hand in a wide gesture. "C'mon, you know what I'm gonna say next."

"Okay," Mike agrees, enunciating the word deliberately, raising his eyebrows and smiling. It looks real, and Johnny takes it for what it is, nodding back.

"Okay. See you at home." He calls the last part over his shoulder, waving as he goes.

They'll have this conversation again if they need to. That's what family does.


End file.
